I'm very excited about everything that we have discussed this last week. What amazes me is the common sense approach to presentations. It's so funny how I can go along, thinking and practicing one method and then suddenly realize that all that I've been doing has been wrong.
In terms of presentation, I would guess that most, if not all, of us who teach practice the casual approach and the "living in the moment" delivery method. I don't know how you couldn't and be an effective teacher, especially if one teaches elementary or high school. There's no way I could be effective with my students while spending my whole time behind a lectern or reading from my notes. At the same time, it's amazing how many teachers do lecture at students instead of engaging them with narratives. In addition, how many classes have we taken, or how many presentations have we seen where the speaker doesn't know when to quit? I know I can be guilty of babbling on and on, but I have sat through some lectures where I thought I was going to have to throw myself out the window. I think much of it has to do with what Garr says about connecting with your audience and knowing your audience. Also, many of those speakers come across as arrogant and clearly don't care about me, just one of many in the crowd. I'm thinking of one particular presentation I went to of a rather famous author. Although he was entertaining, it was clear that he meant to be center-stage only, and so as he solicited questions from the audience his arrogance became clearer and clearer. By the end, I was completely unimpressed. On the other hand, I would love to see some of the speakers Garr mentioned because I love nothing more than to be completely invigorated by a good speaker.
It's funny and ironic that Presentation Zen's emphasis seems to be to create presentations that are minimal in order to bring out and highlight the speaker, rather than glorify the presentation itself. As I have mentioned elsewhere, I think I have relied heavily on my presentations, not feeling adequately prepared or even knowledgeable, and so have loaded my Powerpoints with bullet points for that reason. How much easier it is to just read from my slides, rather than rehearse and develop an interesting narrative.
On a similar note, as my students learn Powerpoint and other storytelling software, I'm emphasizing the same minimalist approach. I have always told them that when creating a show, they shouldn't read from their slides, but now I will stress the less is more and even stipulate how many words on each slide they're allowed to have. It'll be interesting to see how this approach goes over with 3rd and 4th graders. Something else I'm still struggling with, however, is how to incorporate all these great resources when they require registration. I'm still not sure how parents will feel about their children being registered to all these sites where others can comment or view work.
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Thank you for your comments on my post. I agree with the comment you made in your post about getting parents to embrace the digital uses in the school. I find it funny that probably a majority of parents do not have a clue what their kids are into on the internet, but object to some educational use of technology that we want to try at school. But I think the biggest hurdle will be the administration at school. The Tech people are so worried about opening the system up to non filtered media. Our filter at school doesn't filter Animoto, but as of yet our students do not have school email addresses,I suppose I could have them set up yahoo accounts, but have to go through parents and administration for that. Think I will put a question out on the WEMTA site asking LMS if their schools allow email addresses and what the considerations are.
ReplyDeleteKara,
ReplyDeleteStarting from the end of your blog and working backwards, I also have concerns with students producing work that can be viewed by all. Within that framework, I do make sure that the technology I have students use in the classroom has the capability to be private and shared only with me. Many times, the free individual accounts, like Prezi, only allow presentations to be public. I wonder if it would be worthwhile to pay for an account to use with students that allows presentations to be kept private. I wouldn't want to do this a lot, but the price of the Prezi upgrade is not that substantial, and certainly would be worth it considering the enhanced privacy settings.
We have all sat through nauseatingly long presentations, many of which went right over our heads. Remember what Reynolds said earlier in the book about the fact that we are all experts in our field. What we think makes total sense might only make sense to us as presenters. That lack of connection with the audience can really be perceived as arrogance, and at the very least, torture to observe.
I love what Reynolds says concerning getting out from behind the podium and moving around. I think it is always fun to see how students suddenly pay attention when you move close to their personal bubble. :)